NEW YEAR’S DAY AT KUEI-CHOW FU
New Year’s Day arrived at last, as cold and brilliant as if it were not
belated by six weeks. I took a beautiful walk among prosperous farms
where the people were all in gala dress. The houses were decked with
flags and streamers, and even the buff dogs had knots of colour round
their necks. From above the wall the grey city could be seen brilliantly
decorated, and sounds of jubilation came up from it. The suburbs and the
mat town on the river bank were gay and noisy, and much money was spent
on crackers and explosives generally. The junks were decorated, and the
“sing-song” boats blossomed into a blaze of colour. Everyone except my
trackers appeared in new clothes, and threw off the old ones with
rejoicing.
This was my second New Year in China, and I had seen its approach as far
back as Ichang, where, as everywhere, tables appeared in the streets a
month beforehand, and all sorts of tempting articles were displayed upon
them in a tempting manner. This is the time when things can be had
cheap, and many articles of _bric-à-brac_ and embroidered dresses are
for sale which are not obtainable at any other time. For in order to pay
debts, a sacred obligation worthily honoured in the observance, many
families are obliged to part with possessions long cherished. The crowds
in the streets in gala dresses are enormous; children are gaily dressed,
their quaint heads are decorated with flowers, and they receive presents
of toys and _bon-bons_. The toy-shops drive a roaring trade.
Red paper appears everywhere in long strips pasted on the lintels and
doorposts of houses, emblazoned with the characters for happiness and
longevity, and with formal sentences suitable for the festive occasion,
many of which are written on tables in the streets which are provided
with ink-brushes and ink-stones. Every shop is brilliant with these red
papers pasted or suspended, and with _kin hwa_, or “golden flowers,”
much made in Shao Hsing, being artificial flowers and leaves often of
great size, of yellow tinsel on wires, making a goodly show. The
“sing-song” boats were profusely decorated with these, and they are much
used for the New Year offerings in temples, and for the annual
redecoration of the household tablets. Thousands of vegetable wax
candles, with paper wicks, varying in size from the thickness of a man’s
leg to that of his finger, coloured vermilion, and painted with humorous
and mythical pictures, and many other things used for offerings in the
temples, and ribbons and streamers of all descriptions made the streets,
even the mat streets outside Kuei Fu, gay.
[Illustration: A CHINESE PUNCHINELLO.]
For the three previous days unlimited scrubbing of clothes, persons,
doors, chairs, shutters, and all woodwork went on; and though boats were
not as universally turned out and cleaned as at Canton, where I spent a
previous New Year, a good many of the smaller craft were beached and
cleansed inside and out. Even the trackers scrubbed their faces, and
appeared a paler yellow.
Towards the evening of that day, between the din of gongs and the
constant explosion at every door of strings of fireworks intended to
expel evil spirits and prevent others from entering, the noise became
exciting. This idea of expelling evil spirits and preventing their
entrance at the incoming of the year is the same as is carried out in
Korea by the burning in a potsherd at the house door of the hair of all
the inmates, which, when cut off or falling out, is preserved for this
purpose. The Chinese, like the Koreans, believe themselves surrounded by
legions of demons, mainly malignant, who must either be frightened or
propitiated.
Religion plays a most conspicuous part in visits to the temples, and
offerings. At all the farms near Kuei Fu, trees, fences, barns, and
farming implements, as well as houses, had prayers pasted upon them. The
junkmen, though not nearly to the same extent as in Kwantung, pasted
paper prayers on oars, sweeps, mast, and rudder, and hung them over the
boats’ sterns; and every house was purified by a religious ceremonial.
New Year’s Day is kept as the birthday of the entire population, and a
child born on the previous day enters his second year upon it. In the
houses of well-to-do people such birthdays are great occasions; and
abbots, monks, and priests assemble to do them honour, with much noise
and many prayers, some read and others chanted from memory, after which
the written prayers are burned and libations are poured out. It is the
family and social ceremonies connected with idolatry and demonism at
this season which are a special difficulty in the way of Christians.
Among other religious duties, some persons, both men and women, burdened
with the weight of the sins of the year, employ priests to intercede for
them with the unseen powers, and fast, and give away much to the poor.
The temples outside Kuei Fu were thronged for the days preceding the New
Year with men and women, old and young; and in the midst of clouds of
incense rich and poor prostrated themselves before the gods, burning
gold and silver tinsel paper, while gongs, bells, drums, and cymbals
kept up a ceaseless din.
In the midst of the general winding up of all affairs, spiritual and
temporal, and starting on the New Year clear, the great matter of debt
is not forgotten. The paying of debts and settling of accounts is a
highly praiseworthy custom, and one which we might introduce among
ourselves with advantage. Although only a custom, it has all the force
of law. If it can be avoided by any sacrifice, no debt is carried over
New Year’s Day without either an actual settlement or an arrangement
regarded as satisfactory by the creditor. To do otherwise would be to
secure a blasted reputation. If men owe more than they can pay, custom
compels them at this season to put all they have into the hands of their
creditors and close their business concerns; and one among the causes of
suicide is when men have not enough to pay their debts with. Interest on
loans rises, the pawnbrokers’ warehouses are choke-full, and most kinds
of commodities fall in value, while second-hand clothing and many other
personal possessions are to be bought cheap. The future to a Chinese
often consists of little more than his funeral and the New Year! People
dread the difficulties, expense, and delays of resorting to law for the
recovery of debts; and all are agreed on maintaining this wholesome
custom, which has a great tendency to weed out from among traders the
shifty and dishonest. I have heard that one method of compelling an
unwilling debtor to pay his debts is to remove the door from his house
or shop, so as to allow of the ingress of evil and malignant demons.
This last resort is said never to fail!
All the ceremonies which are to welcome the New Year, with the
garnishing of the house with red paper, tinsel flowers, streamers, and
the pictures, ornamenting of the ancestral shrine, and the general
“redding up,” occupy much of the previous night; and the stillness of
the first hours of the great day reminds one of an old-fashioned Scotch
Sunday.
Towards noon the streets begin to fill, as in America, with men with
card-cases paying visits. All are well dressed, even to the coolies, for
those who have not grand clothes hire them. Inside Kuei Fu sedan chairs
were _en règle_; outside, men made their calls on foot, in many
instances cards sufficing, inscribed with a device suggesting the three
good wishes of children (_i.e._ sons), wealth or rank, and longevity.
Men meeting in the streets greeted each other with profound respect, and
with the good wish, “May the new joy be yours,” which reminded me of the
Syrian salutation on the feast of the Epiphany, or with the words, “I
respectfully wish you joy.” Universal politeness and good behaviour
prevailed, and not a tipsy man was to be seen during the day or evening.
Mourners remain within doors, and strips of blue paper mixed with red
denote houses into which death has entered during the previous year.
Be-dien told me that in the city, where there are many _literati_ and
rich men, there were houses with all their woodwork covered with
gold-sprinkled red paper, and on the lintels five slips expressing the
desire of the owner for the “five blessings”: riches, health, love of
virtue, longevity, and a natural death. Over some shops was a decorated
slip, “May rich customers ever enter this door,” and in many stately
vestibules, in which handsome presentation coffins were reared on end,
there were costly scrolls inscribed with aphorisms and other
sentences.[27]
On New Year’s Day gods and ancestors receive prostrations, and are
presented with gifts in the temples and in the clan or family ancestral
halls. It would be a gross breach of etiquette and an unthinkable
outrage if inferiors were not to pay their respects to superiors, pupils
to salute their teachers, and children to prostrate themselves before
their parents.
When evening came, lanterns, transparencies, and fireworks appeared, and
very effective coloured fires reddened the broad bosom of the Yangtze.
Hilarious sounds proceeding from closed doors showed that, as in Korea
at the same hour, sacrifices were being offered to departed parents, and
that families were gathered at the final feast of the day. My trackers
hung coloured lanterns from the matted roof and feasted on pork with
wine, but there was no excess, and it was a real pleasure to see them
get one good meal with time to enjoy it. Owing to the moderate use of
intoxicants, and that chiefly with food, the three holidays of this
universal festival pass by without turmoil or disgrace, and the
population goes back to trade and work out of debt and not demoralised
by its spell of social festivity.
So the most ancient of the world’s existing civilisations comports
itself on its great holiday, while our civilisation of yesterday,
especially in Scotland, what with “first-footing,” “treating,” and
general sociability, is apt to turn the holiday into a pandemonium.